Catalogue of theatrical and public celebrities
Title
Catalogue of theatrical and public celebrities
Description
Trade catalog containing pages with rows of numbered vignette-size reproduced portrait photographs of female , male, and child entertainers. Includes bust-length, half-length, and full-length portraiture, with one sitter often depicted in several differently posed portraits. Sitters, predominantly women, are usually attired in costume and occasionally are posed as couples, or in character and with props and ornate backdrops. Costumes and props include hats and head pieces; tights and shorts; nautical, peasant, medieval and roman garb; umbrellas, fans and valises; chairs and hammocks; guns and swords; and instruments and animals. Unique costumes and poses include Jeannie Winston as a devil with wings; Kate Forsyth depicted as a sculpted bust; and Lizzie Harold sprawled on a floor., Sitters include French operatic soprano Marie Roze (1846-1926); American entertainer Lotta [Crabtree] (1847-1924); American actress Annie Pixley (1858-1893); comic actors Charles E. Holland and Ben Maginley (d. 1888); actress and theater manager Mrs. John Drew (i.e., Louisa Lane Drew); French magician Prof. Hermann, i.e., Alexander Hermann(1843-1896), author and actress Lillian Chester; and characters from "Pinafore.", Accompanied by pocket-size, printed catalog with preface promoting Gilbert & Bacon's large stock of portrait views of the "most artistic and prominent in their profession" in the sizes "Cabinets" and "Panels." Includes lists of sitters for 1692 "Cabinets" and 115 "Panels.", Front endpaper inscribed: George P. Campbell, Continental Hotel, August 1880. Campbell, probably a Gilbert & Bacon agent, resided at the hotel in the 1880s., Cloth binding, stamped "Scrap" on front cover and "Patented March 1876" on back cover., Cataloging funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (PW-506-19-10), 2010-2012., Gilbert & Bacon, the portrait studio established by Philadelphia photographers Charles M. Gilbert (b. ca. 1848) and William F. Bacon (ca. 1843-1900), operated ca. 1874-ca. 1929. The firm specialized in celebrity portraiture and photographed actors, baseball players, and members of high society. Following the death of Bacon in 1900, the firm continued in business under the management of Gilbert and Bacon's son Frank T. into the early 20th century.
Creator
Gilbert & Bacon
Date
[ca. 1880]
Location
Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department albums [P.8681.1 & 2]
American celebrities album
Title
American celebrities album
Description
Two volume set of albums containing predominately cartes de visite photographic portraits of prominent American 19th-century figures in politics, education, and the arts. Portraits depict actors, artists, authors, Congressmen, educators, governors, military leaders, physicians, publishers, religious leaders, social reformers, scientists, and U.S. presidents and their spouses. Includes mostly vignette and bust-length portraits and a small number of full length portraits. Also contains a small number of trimmed portrait engravings, tintypes, and a photo-collage depicting evangelist D. L. Moody with the under photograph copyrighted 1877. Small number of sitters are unidentified., Men sitters include P. T. Barnum; Henry Ward Beecher; John Brown; Ned Buntline; Samuel Clemens; Jefferson Davis; O. S. Fowler; Oliver Wendell Holmes; Abraham Lincoln; Samuel Morse; Thomas Nast; Hiram Powers; Winfield Scott; Gerrit Smith; Cornelius Vanderbilt; John Wanamaker; Brigham Young; Native American chiefs Ouray, Spotted Tail, and Sitting Bull; and African Americans Frederick Douglass and performer "Blind" Tom. Women sitters include presidential spouses Frances Cleveland and Lucretia Garfield; reformers Susan B. Anthony and Victoria Woodhull; authors Louisa May Alcott, Helen Hunt (Jackson), Harriet Beecher Stowe; sculptors Harriet Hosmer and Vinnie Ream; and performers Maria Albani, Charlotte Cushman, and Kate Field., Title from item's cover., Photographers include Mathew Brady, E. & H. T. Anthony; Jeremiah Gurney; and George Kendall Warren., Majority of sitters identified by a manuscript note on the album page or on portrait or an inscribed label., Brown leather bindings with gilt, stamped in gilt on front boards: Volume I: American Celebrities. Vol. I.; Volume II: American Celebrities. Vol. II. Stamped in gilt on spines: Album., Purchase 1985., Description revised 2021., Access points revised 2021., Cataloging funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (PW-506-19-10), 2010-2012., See "American Celebrities Album" item-level records for digital images of all identified individual sitters.
Date
[ca. 1870-ca. 1890]
Location
Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department albums [P.9100.1 & 2]